Rip and Re-edit Question

[dmr1]

I would like to rip and reedit videos that I've created using Sony Vegas/Architect. Which program would you suggest.

[guns1inger]

Depends on what sort of editing needs to be done.

You have to take into account that you have already compressed these videos at least once just getting them to DVD. This was a lossy compression that cost you data. Re-encoding these will cause some further degradation of the video quality.

If your editing is simple - trims and tightening - then use a dedicated mpeg-2 edior, such as Womble Mpeg Video Wizard or Videoredo. These will allow you make these types of edits without having to re-encode the entire video.

If your editing requires are more extensive then you should convert your video to a lossless format - huffyuv or lagarith are recommended - so you can edit in Vegas. You will still take a hit when you output for DVD at the end of the process, as this will again be lossy, but the intermediate stage won't cost you quality. Be aware though - lossless video needs space. Expect the files to be 30 - 40 GB per hours of footage.

[dmr1]

Guns1inger,

Thanks for the quick reply.

Two questions,
1) The two programs you reference, Mpeg Video Wizard and Videoredo, will rip the VOB files AND create MPEG's?
2) If I want to go the lossless route what program would I use?

[guns1inger]

1) I would rip the DVDs to your HDD with DVD Decrypter first, then edit. Yes, both will output mpg files if you need them, or can demux to elementary streams for authoring.

2) I would use DGIndex to create a .d2v, load this with avisynth into virtualdub, and save it to lagarith